She looked round, vaguely scared, and saw that a slim black Alvis had drawn up beside the kerb. At the wheel was Simon Langtoft.
‘How are you, Alison? I thought it must be you, but you didn’t hear me the first time I called.’
‘Didn’t I? I’m sorry.’ She felt dull and stupid, and unable to think of anything to say.
‘Can I give you a lift?’ he asked.
But she didn’t much want to go in Simon’s car and perhaps be questioned.
‘No, thank you. I-I’m shopping, you see.’
‘Shopping, dear?’ His expression changed his voice was suddenly extremely gentle. ‘But you can’t be shopping, you know. It’s Saturday afternoon. The shops have been closed for hours.’
She gave him a nervous little smile.
‘Oh, yes, of course. It’s Saturday afternoon,’ she repeated. and slowly her eyes filled with tears.
‘Alison, won’t you get in and let me drive you home?’
‘No-oh, no, thank you. I couldn’t go home.’
There was a second’s pause.
‘Then will you just let me drive you somewhere-anywhere-until you’re feeling better?’
She didn’t answer that in words. She slipped silently into the seat beside him.
He leaned over and banged the door. And the black Alvis slid away into the stream of traffic once more.
There was silence except for the hum of the motor. Then presently Alison began to cry quietly. Simon still didn’t say anything, but she knew he must know what she was doing.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said in a whisper. ‘I’ll stop in a minute.’
‘It doesn’t matter. And don’t bother to talk. Just lean back and take it quietly.’ He pushed a rug towards her with one hand. ‘Tuck that round you. It will keep you warm.’
She obeyed him mechanically, and presently she closed her eyes.
At last she opened them. It was dark outside, and for a bitter moment she was reminded of that strange drive with Julian on the first day of their honeymoon. But this time it was not Julian who was beside her. It was Simon. And there seemed to be a curious significance in the similarity- and the difference.
‘Simon, where are we?’ she asked a little huskily.
‘Somewhere quite near the coast, but that isn’t as far away from London as it sounds. If you feel you can manage some food, I think we ought to stop and have some dinner soon. It isn’t good for you to go so long without anything.’
‘Very well,’ Alison said listlessly, and they relapsed into silence again. She felt dully grateful to him for that, for it was extraordinarily kind and tactful of him to remain silent when all the time there must be a hundred questions he longed to ask.
‘But perhaps he knows I’d just cry again if he asked them,’ thought Alison.
‘This will do, I think.’ Simon drew the car to a standstill outside a country hotel. It had an air of solid comfort about it, without any suggestion of loudness or too much liveliness.
He helped her out of the car, and kept his hand round her arm in firm support as they went into the hotel.
A long panelled dining-room-with high-backed, carved settees which shut off the tables from each other-promised some measure of privacy, and, after one glance at her, Simon proceeded to order the meal without reference to her.
Again she was thankful to him for not troubling her with questions, and gradually, as she ate, she felt a little strength and coherence of thought coming back to her.
He made her have a dash of brandy with her coffee, and after that a faint colour came back into her cheeks, and she managed to smile slightly at him.
‘Thank you. You’re really being most awfully kind.’
‘No, I’m being kind to myself too,’ he told her a little curtly.
She glanced down. ‘I mean-it was kind of you not to ask questions.’
‘I didn’t need to. Only one thing would make you look like that.’ He spoke with the faintest touch of bitterness, and then seemed to make an effort to conquer it, for he added gently, ‘I suppose Julian has-’ He stopped.
‘He can’t help loving Rosalie,’ Alison said quickly, and then she too stopped, because it was strange to be defending him for something which had hurt her so terribly.
‘Rosalie has broken off her present engagement, hasn’t she?’
‘Yes.’ Alison bit her lip.
‘So that-’
‘I know, I know,’ Alison broke in sharply. ‘If he hadn’t rushed into this absurd marriage, he would be free to-to go back to the woman he really wants. You needn’t put it into words, Simon. I know all the arguments backwards.’
Simon remained quite silent.
‘It would be almost-simple, if Rosalie were anything different.’ Alison spoke slowly, as though she were thinking aloud.
‘What do you mean?’ Simon’s voice was quiet still, but a certain quality of urgency had crept into it.
‘She’s so cruel, Simon So cruel and mean and petty. Don’t think I’m saying this because I’m jealous. I was once, but I’ve got a long way past that now.’ Alison pushed back her fringe wearily and leaned her forehead on her hand. ‘Rosalie hasn’t really forgiven him one atom for marrying me, and she doesn’t love him in any deep sense at all. She’d enjoy taking it out of him.’
‘Isn’t that rather his own affair?’ Simon said, a trifle drily. ‘You can’t live his life for him, you know.’
‘No, but I might stop him from ruining it,’ She sighed. ‘I wish I knew if I were being really honest about this. It’s so hard to know.’
There was silence for a moment or two, and then she said, ‘What time is it, Simon?’
‘Latish. Between eight and nine.’
She looked horrified.
‘So late? Oh, we must get back. Julian will wonder what on earth has happened.’
‘Does that matter?’
‘Well, of course.’
‘Suppose you didn’t go back.’ Simon spoke slowly.
‘Oh, don’t be silly.’ Alison made an impatient little movement. ‘One can’t solve things like that. It wouldn’t be my way, in any case. Whatever I decide to do, I must have it out frankly with Julian, and all the cards must be on the table.’
‘All the cards, Alison?’
She dropped her eyes.
‘Perhaps not quite all,’ she admitted in a low voice.
He didn’t say anything to that. And then he settled the bill and they went out to the car once more.
‘Will it take us very long to get home?’ she asked anxiously.
‘Not very long.’
They drove for a while in silence. Then: ‘Where are we now?’ Alison said nervously. ‘It’s so dark I can’t see anything.’
‘Don’t you recognise the outline of that mill over there against the sky?’
‘No. Ought I to?’
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘We’re quite near my cottage.’
‘Your cottage? Then we still have quite a long way to go.’
‘No,’ he told her. ‘It’s not more than an hour’s run in this car.’
‘Even so-’ she began.
‘We were so near that I thought it best to stop for ten minutes. You’ve looked so cold and tired for the last half-hour: you must have a hot drink of some sort.’
‘Oh, no,’ Alison said quickly. ‘Oh, no, I don’t want it, Simon, really.’
‘My dear’-Simon spoke quietly but firmly’-’it wouldn’t take very much at the moment to make you really ill, I insist on our stopping, if it’s only for a few minutes. I can’t risk your getting a chill when you’re in this state.’
Alison gave up the argument, but when they drew up outside the cottage and he led the way up the path, her heart was full of misgiving.
He switched on the lights as they came in, and put a match to the log fire.
‘Simon, it isn’t necessary. We shall only be here a few minutes,’ she protested.
But he only smiled and said:
‘Sit down and get warm I’ll not be a moment,’
‘Are the two-I mean-are your housekeeper and her husband not here?’
‘No. They’ll have gone home by now,’ Simon said calmly, and went off into the kitchen to see what he could find.